Magazine style - all inclusive

[alp]

A lot of rain last night

Took some photos at Langthorns with the small camera

This one is from Blue Diamond

Last night I was disturbed by the loud noise. Loud and sharp. This morning, I heard an explosion and I realised it was from the Hamamellis seeds I picked up yesterday. They were asking for £20 even reduced. I bought a stellata Magnolia, a Moerheim Beauty and a packet of daff, a martagon lily pink morning. Set me back £25.

The little pineapple will cost you £17

After catching up with the Beechgrove and GW, I wanted to buy Ruby the dwarf thornless raspberry. Paid £15 for one in 3L and £10 for some canes for Polka. Then I went to Longacre and saw one Ruby for under a tenner. So mad. Any way, I bought it as well. Ruby all sold out on websites because of Monty. I really enjoyed GW last night. More informative.

On the Sutton website, I found the Sweetcorn Moonshine very highly recommended by Beechgrove, bought it and I always fancied a doughnut peach tree.

The cheapest doughnut was like £26.99. I actually smashed some seed pods and tried to stratify them in the fridge. That will take a long time. Sutton seeds website said if I put any two trees in the basket, the discount would be added automatically. I double checked that they were on offer THREE TIMES. I sent them an email and paid for sweetcorn seeds and a packet of teasels. Days later, i got the sweetcorn and teasel seeds, and then nearly about 1 week later, someone replied to my email and said that the Vigne de peche and doughnut Saturn were not on offer. Of course, by that time, the offer disappeared. I was soooooooooo maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad!

Another place sold the tree, but postage is the same as the tree, nearly £14!

 

[Zenj]

Morning all dry at the moment but looks like ne in for another rainy week ,alp teasel I planted it for the benefit of the gold finches a few years ago it self seeds like the clappers pulled all out ,but still pulling seedlings out .A few of my neibours have it now probably from my original sowings.

 

[Perki]

Cake looks delicious Zenji bit of custard with it yummy . The goldfinch feast on my echinacea seed heads over winter very interesting to watch , I may leave quite a bit of the garden untidy over winter / not cutting things back.

Hamamelis variety's you common see are mostly grafted hence why they are so expensive , it speeds up the flowering process. If you want flowers soon alp I would by a grafted plant a seedling could take many years to flower . £17 for a pineapple plant they do look brilliant ,the plant dies after its fruits so a very expensive pineapple.

I have raspberry Polka and a few others Joan J and another newer varity called erika. I'll be moving them over the winter I think I'll scrap Joan J and Erika much inferior plants to polka . I were having a look in some raspberries last week, raspberry can get a fly can't remember the scientific name but these fly lay eggs in raspberries , I thought they only really affect summer variety's but after finding quite a few maggots last week its really put me off raspberries , I wonder how many of them I've already ate .

Another wet start to the day but hasn't rained since I've been up. I went out today on the bike to have one last nosey at a GC who normally has plenty in the sale bay , nothing to be had and not much on the bulb front either so only come away with some orange pansy. Not the best time to be out on a bike loads of wet leaves on greasy roads and its getting cold so I'll not miss going out on the bike for a while . Give the bike a wash when I got home, removed the battery and put it to bed for the winter .

 

[alp]

Morning all dry at the moment but looks like ne in for another rainy week ,alp teasel I planted it for the benefit of the gold finches a few years ago it self seeds like the clappers pulled all out ,but still pulling seedlings out .A few of my neibours have it now probably from my original sowings.

I have tried sowing teasels upteen times - all for the sake of the goldfinches. I could hear them as they have a distinctive mate call, but only saw them once or twice on the bird feeders in a whole year. I have never seen any seedlings. I get so fed up, but I really must rry again. I feel like emptying a bag of niger seeds to see the end result - cheaper than buying it from this place any way. £2 for postage. I am tempted by RHS plant sales. I wish I were your neighbours. Bet they might be cursing! LOL!

The birds here are snobs. They have feast everywhere. I should have got to wilko to buy mealworms and peanuts, but the squirrels have damaged my feeders and after that, no more peanuts for me. Seeing how tits eating them makes me think again. I want to make a pond, so that I can enjoy seeing birds bathing in it! I bet they will snub me as well! I wish I could see birds feasting on my echinacea seed heads. There are sound reasons for being not tidy. The mess including leaves, stems and seedhead can provide shelters for bugs, feast for bugs and insulaton for your plants. Now you know why my garden is so messy!

I researched and saw 2 familiar names Bob.. and Ver.. talking about polka and so I bought it. I can understand your frustration, Perki! I will soon have 2 Ruby the dwarf variety trialled by Monty. I have to say I should ask the allotmenteer for some canes as he has loads which he doesn't bother to harvest. I have taken some and only one cane took in my garden. I have dug it up as I don't know where to site it.

Allotment this year has been a disaster - Scarlet Emperior toppled the slender frame and kept falling onto my potatoes. The skin was tough and beans small.

All the vegs failed to come up.

No carrots in the allotment.

Radishes turned into woody stems and totally inedible.

Quinoas looked like weeds and the grains were so tiny that I couldn't even harvest them.

Spring onions are big and now tough in texture.

Butternut squash are still forming.

The only good thing is the cucumbers which were small.

About 4 Uchiki Kuris the skin of which is incredibly tough to cut.

Bolotto beans were good but they are sprouting after being picked.

One potato strain had very tough texture which took a long time to cook and still tasted crunchy!

Some potatoes were harvested inside the rootball of hellebores.

They are just everywhere. From now on, they go inside a plastic bag
Watermelon seeds turned out to be pumpkin. I will never buy watermelon seeds again. I will buy one, eat it and keep the seeds. So fed up with this metamorphosis. .

Still trialling my bigger camera

Salvia Neon

Duo

Red echinacea

Posh pompon from Blue Diamond

Dyson's Joy!

Lost a bit of details compared with my old PL70. The screen pics looked much better than the photos here!

 

[Zenj]

Morning all more rain but dry at the moment ,So Perki the bikes away for the winter,I had a bsa beezer in my younger days and my best mate a Ariel square four 1000cc and such a weight happy days.

 

[Perki]

Everyone seem to have bikes back in the day , my dad always going on about them racing down various roads trying to get to 100mph. can't remember what bike he had cause he normally tells me who had which bike and then they got this bike and I got this bike.

 

[alp]

I wish Little Emperor knows how to ride a bike, but as a mum, a bike is like an egg without a shell. Read this on the paper yesterday. All the comments said that Range Rover drivers thought they owned the roads. The RV driver needed to be fine heavily. No basic road sense. Imagine that to a cyclist. Having said that, it's all written in the stars. If we think along that line, we don't need to go out. Life is full of risks. Glad that you 're going to overwinter your motorcycle though, Perki!

We have, since last year, a family of motorheads across the road, literally. They made their exhausts *art with the loudest of thuds, but they are decent people. I saw them line up clapping for carers. Wish they would think being considerate when they let off their *arts. They have been a bit quieter. But yesterday, some extreme motorhead let his explosive *arts in a series of bombs all the way from the round-about to down the road. It was terrifying. Louder than the loudest fireworks!

I airlayered 2 branches of an acer standard, one of the Cornus Rubra and I didn't have the growth hormone to hand. It was a mess and I wish I had done it in May to August. But if I didn't do it now, I might be dead next year. I'd like to live in hope, but the earlier I do them, the better. Next thing is to find the growth hormone and air layer al my lovely fruit trees - Gala, Fiesta, Mirabelle de Nancy, Claude d'Oullins (lovely fruit) ..

Penstemon Arabesque F1 Red is still going strong!

Penstemon Black Bird

I have two clumps of this Summer series Alstromerias

This is a convoluted Dahia Special X Factor - the only good thing is that these flowers should improve next year as they are quite late. The white is purity itself!

Phyllis Fancy which should be at the front. Where it is, it's blocking the light and heat for my irises.

Would you believe it, this iris is trying to add some colours and fun to my garden. Very pleased.

Helper gave us this horrible toolbox which had a leak. I was furious as this piece of junk means I had something else to throw away. Then I bought all these marginals and needed a container. I lined this toolbox which still looks beyond redemption, but hey, out comes a flowering stem! Nice for the tired and bedraggled garden!

 

[alp]

Zenj: If you fancy a splurge BBCGWOCT20 for farmer gracie. I bought some more and used this code.

 

[alp]

Pompon Natal

Colour Spectacle - not much of a spectacle - Rather blurred vison

Rubra Cornus baked potato 1

Baked potatoes 2 and 3 for my £2 Acer standard. Three days ago, I was removing the dead leaves in amidst the strikingly red leaves. Yesterday, I found the winds had removed the lot!

Still flowering Cirsium Atropurpureum. I wish I had bought the white thistle - statuesque 6 foot all. The flowers considerably bigger than these.

Torment: so buggy and yet could have been so beautiful in this miserable weather! I'd love to layer it. Shame not to! Clematis Joesphine! A real empress!

 

[alp]

France is having 2nd national lockdown and a whole family was drowned trying to come here via a boat. RIP. So perilous. Even on land, the winds were merciless!

I hope Joe Blog remembers his rival name! Long and tedious campaigns do take a toll on you.

Yesterday, I was tidying up Little Emperor's correspondence. I read a strange direct debit in a bank statement from one of the worldwide banks. When he was home, he phoned up and reported a fraud. It was under the name LEX ?? It's all very strange as we have had no DD instruction. Any way, do go through your bank accounts. The company might be legit, but the DD certainly not. Any way, all the leisure business venues are more or less closing, to see such an entry was shocking , to say the least. So beware and don't take things for granted. He never tidied up his bank statements, let alone read it.

*********************

Good morning and it's dry, but soon it will be pelting down.

Helper came yesterday 10.30 - early according to his standard. He thought he would finish the roof. The winds were seriously distractions. We ended up tying scaffolding sheets round the two greenhouse frames. To add insult to injury, he could not fathom how to stop the bottom roof glass panes from slipping and we googgled and he went home to fashion some S clips and of course, not one single pane was fixed the whole day. I wish I had the same conventional greenhouses, but he really loved this one - it was very, very old and the base tapers towards the top, just a tad, but much. So all the glass panes on two front sides are quadrilaterals and not rectangles. And because of that, the two greenhouse can't be joined together as one. Very annoying. Now that the base is cemented, it will have to stay. The winds are not condusive to reassembling old greenhouse. I kept telling him that I don't mind using sheets to wrap round the blessed frames.

Then he told me it might be too late to bake potatoes. Well, he could be right, if the sap stops flowing and leaves shedding, it really could be too late. 2 more on Sunblest Cherry and that's my lot.

I will take a lot of cuttings today.

 

[alp]

Yes, it rained and rained and I think how bad it can be for both of you up north! I remember when we were in Cumbria - it was nothing but rainy weather and the grey indigenous stones just didn't help. If I lived there, I would painted it pink, light blue, or green. Anything but not grey! How miserable and depressing.

I did do quite a bit of cuttings of Fancy Pants the seed pods of which should have been left to dry. I feel like kicking myself. I have one seed pod which can be dried. I also take cuttins with Pooh, the orangy collarette. I love the bluish one, but I haven't seen any more flowers. I need to go to the allotment to take some Rejman's Firecracker cuttings. My only one got me £1. I wish I hadn't done it. Any way, I told the woman I wouldn't be selling her any more.

Dahlias are still going strong

Mrytle's Folly

This pompon is a bit pale

A red Echinacea which I bought for £3.60 from Glebe in Enfield.

Gaillardia from seed

Helenium Fugue? from B&Q - non stop flowering

Omega

Penstemon Volcano series. Etna I think

Red Rock

Red Lion

Alan T and his various shopping spoils! Er, no his Secret Garden! I prefer Monty's garden to this shop bought instant gardening! I don't think I can afford ONE of these standards, let alone 7 (at least) of them. To deck his garden with shop bought topiary and then call it his garden! A bit cheeky!

 

[Perki]

Another wet day like most of October , I've only done 2 days of work in the past 2 week due to the weather .

I've dug out my large white buddelia this evening in the front garden , nice when it flowered for all of two week then nothing rather bland overgrown shrub. It was a gift so I were a bit reluctant to take it out but with having a smallish garden everything got to pull it weight. I've ordered my Parrotia to replace the buddelia but no sign of it yet . Did a bit of pottering around on Wednesday in the GH just a bit of general tidy round , made a winter pot up Tulip comet - blue muscari and some orange / black pansies.

Last gardeners world tonight you know the season defiantly coming to a end when GW ends, I am a couple of episodes behind so I've still got some viewing time yet.

 

[alp]

Went out early and went to Chelmsford Longacres and generally killed some time going round gcs. Went to Buckhatch again. I would say it was one of the best. It was quiet as the weather report was frightening. A sea of blue covering Essex, but no. it was dry until we got to Hyde Hall and then it was dense drizzle and we had to rush home 4pm as there is no light left to see anything. It was incredibly busy there.

My buddleia is still potted and tied up like a standard. I am scared of putting trees down as we have seen quite a few houses with subsidence due to big trees.

Blue Diamond gc: Lovely but the noise from traffic was horrific!

:Buckhatch

A lovely and fragrant rose!

Look how lucky some gcs are! Huge stretches of water.

Hyde Hall and these acer stems were so red and striking!

Salvia Glutinosa - shame there wasn't enough light.

This is my latest quest - this white thistle was so statuesque

Never very keen on grass, apart from stipa, but this is a dreamy frothy fog of pink specks. Full of grace!

australian section

The focus was wrong here - the lovely blue salvia is so blurred.

Lovely Giingko and I realised that they planted about 8 of these in the town centre to fight pollution - what a lovely idea and they were now all yellow just like this one. Must have cost the council quite a bit.

 

[alp]

National lockdown next week! Sir Graham Brady was correct. We should cost the whole saga. Those with directorships and shares in the big pharmas shouldn't be sitting on panel deciding on lockdowns. It's in their vested interest to frighten us to death so that the prices of their drugs which wouldn't have time to show up it after-effects soar sky-high!

**********************************
The following photos are just so dark as light was fading and the drizzle intensified. Then when we were near the gate, it stopped; by that time, I was hot and bothered. Even just now, I was woken up by the heat. It has been very warm.

Such a viid blue - amazing salvia

This is not a wishes, but the pink is just so endearing and it really is striking!

Salvia Argentinia skies

A most strange salvia I think. The flowers are very small and are orange in colour.

Phyllis Fancy

What I like most is Leucantha, but I have forgotten to take a photo.

Taken from internet - near enough to capture that colour.

Yesterday, my lame hen was already at the exit where they launched into the air and then onto the garden. As we had to go out, I couldn't let them out. When I started feeding them inside, she looked at me with sad eyes and went back to her feeding balcony. I felt so bad and sad. Of course, her safe haven was then taken by a most alert hen. All very sad.

It was amazing to see all these hens launch themselves up. The lower coop is about 2 feet from the ground. As soon as I opened the top, some 4 of them would take off and then launch into air with confidence and pride. My lame friend would be up but as she had the use of only one leg, she was dithering which way to come down. I helped her last time I really admired her spirit.

Blue Diamond was selling their bulbs half price. But my martagon lilies had gone. I had bought one Pink Morning and there was one left. Yesterday, there was no more. I nearly bought an XXL Ambassador bulb, and another 2 fritillarias. But I changed my mind and came home with a box instead.

I binged on Beechgrove and have watched all the episodes and there is only last night's GW episode to catch up. Hope Monty is carrying on with Adam. I like the 2 of them and Nick Bailey with his gems and special snippets. Carol with her techniques rather than her flowery description of how the flowers and plants sing together. Rachel I am not so keen. They gave her nearly 20 minutes in 2 episodes. I nearly wanted to fast forward. I might like them more had I been interested in pots. Here in East London, I can't even water enough plants on the ground, let alone in pots.

Catch up TV and HDclump are so good.

 

[alp]

Went to Enfield and all the bulbs - nearly 5 lines x 2 x20 crates all sold out. Amazing!